


i who must travel on (what hope for me)

by Weddersins



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Timeline, Alternate Universe, F/M, FG Leia, FG Luke, Force Bond (Star Wars), Force Bond Metaphysics, Force Echoes, Force Visions, Good Boy Sweater, Grief/Mourning, HEA, Happily Ever After, I hear your cherished voice across the moreland skies, Luke has zero sense of timing, Mysteries of the Force, Post tros fic, Post-Canon Fix-It, Sort of World-Between-Worlds-ish, but not for long, canonverse, rey on tatooine, shades of Jane Eyre
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-15
Updated: 2020-03-15
Packaged: 2021-02-28 17:54:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23161288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Weddersins/pseuds/Weddersins
Summary: After Exegol, Rey retreats to Tatooine and tries for forget. But something keeps reminding her, and after a while, she has to listen.
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 7
Kudos: 44
Collections: Reylo Charity Anthology: Volume 2





	i who must travel on (what hope for me)

It’s her fifth sunset here.

Rey stands on a mountain of sand, watches the light creep down below the horizon. Night is falling quickly, and with it her resolve.

There’s a figure tinged in blue standing by the open doorway to the hovel, but Rey ignores his stoic presence. It’s not who she wants to see, it’s not his voice that she continues to seek—

Despite her best intentions. Despite the cold hand of reality on her throat; the constant aching in her side.

She wants to open herself back up, to wade into the river of Force and scream for him until the air fades from her lungs, 'til her throat is raw and her eyes blurred—

_It hasn’t even been a week,_ she tells herself. _It will pass._

It’s a lie, but Rey knows all too well that oft-repeated lies become their own kind of truth. It was a falsehood she was comfortable living inside.

She listens to the wind, to the quiet hum of the moisture evaporators, to the soft noises of the desert at dusk, and tells herself that she never expected to hear him again anyway. That she came here to forget.

The suns slip below the horizon and Rey turns back to the hovel. There is nothing more to see here.

\---

It is her twentieth sunrise, and Rey can hear the sandstorm raging outside before even stirring from her bed. She lies under the rough blanket for longer than she usually does—there is no one to tell her to get up anyway—and listens to the grains of sand pelting the exterior of her new home.

She worries for a moment about damage, before a part of her almost welcomes it—tinkering repairs to fill her empty days.

She swears there’s a voice crying her name in the wind, but knows it’s just a lie of the heart. The desire to believe is hidden away, and hope is a mouth too costly to feed.

She came here to _forget_.

_She wants to forget,_ she reminds herself.

The numbness under her ribs tells a different story. Facing the wall, Rey closes her eyes and wiggles her toes, imagining each grain of sand eroding her pain in the same way as it did to the rocks outside.

She wonders if the lightsabers remain where she buried them - she could call to them, listen to their faint echoes and find out—

but she wouldn’t.

She lies there for hours, unblinking gaze fixated on the wall before her. The line between wakefulness and sleep blurs and stretches, and Rey floats in the sandstorm’s wake.

Then—a sharp tug, a jolt of pain beneath her ribs.

**_Rey_**.

The voice is small but it is _there_.

In a snap Rey rises from the bed, the fog of sleep dissipating in an instant. She runs to the front of the house, up the few short stairs to emerge on the sandy plain—

What was it she expected to find? There’s nothing but sand and clouded sky for miles, shifted dunes and blurred suns making the already-unusual landscape unfamiliar once again.

Alone, and empty.

She chides herself for her hope, for her fear. Twists the thin fabric of her tunic between sweaty palms and tries to calm her racing heart.

Her ribs are _sore_ now, the dull ache having turned to a crackle - a wheeze.

But there is nothing to show for it. She’s alone.

Even her ghosts have gone.

Rey turns back into the hovel, forces herself to think only of caf and burnt toast. She tinkers long into the night, numbing her fingers with activity in an effort to shut out the quiet yet insistent voice that she _knew_ was calling her name.

\---

It’s the eighty-third afternoon, and Rey continues to ignore the steadfast presence of her erstwhile mentor as she disassembles his former workshop.

“Rey, that’s… oh, okay, that’s fine, just throw that away.”

_clang_

“That might be useful later, we used that for the moisture evaporators on the south ridge—”

_clang_

“... Now you’re just being petty.”

_clang_

Rey is covered in grime and sand. Sweat rolls down her brow and shines her arms as she ruthlessly combs through the cluttered space.

**_Are you back to scavenging again?_ **

She growls, slamming the door shut on _that_ voice, because _it’s not real, it’s never been real_ —

**_Of course I’m real._ **

The months of whispers meant nothing, because there was nothing for them to mean.

She picks up a small cylindrical bolt and examines it, feels the tiniest buzz of energy across her palm—

And sees the farm-boy, golden hair shining in the dim lights of the workshop, matching the plating of the droid he examines.

Rey shakes her head, turns the bolt over between calloused fingers. She doesn’t discard it like the rest of the detritus, and Luke’s ghost skims a bit closer to her.

“Oh, that’s - that was Threepio’s. Huh.”

There is awe and nostalgia in Luke’s tone, and it sickens Rey. Another unpleasant reminder that the life she thought she chose for herself was just the remnants of someone else’s glory. That the path _she_ truly wanted was gone for good.

She sets the bolt down on the workbench, wordlessly turning to face the Jedi Master. He smiles, maddeningly serene.

“Is something wrong, Rey?” he asks, the earnestness in his voice cloying.

_Yes._ “No,” she lies, watches the old Jedi’s face flicker with doubt. “Everything is fine.”

**_No, it’s not._ **

She winces.

Luke hums, plainly disbelieving her but content not to pursue it. “I think you’re doing a remarkable job adjusting, considering.”

Rey nods noncommittally, not in the mood for this or _any_ conversation. She turns back to the pile of scrap in the corner, focuses on some of the smaller things leaning against the wall. Surely there’d be something in here she could sell.

“It’s a bitter wound, isn’t it?”

Rey doesn't reply, but her palms begin to sweat.

“The loss of someone you’re connected to, especially after _all that?_ I can only speculate of course, but given the writings on dyads—”

“Luke,” Rey grinds out, teeth gritted.

But the old Jedi did not appear to have gotten any wiser in death than he had been in life.

“You should talk about it, Rey.”

“I’d really rather not.”

“To have that deep of a connection, and to have it snatched away from you—”

“Luke, _please_ —”

“—it must be like—”

“Like what? Like death?” Rey rounds on him, her anger that always boils beneath the surface bubbling over, “Like I’m dying, everyday—like I have one foot in the grave and I’ll stay that way forever? Like there’s a hole in my chest that can never be filled— _a permanent wound,_ and whenever I seek the Force it tastes like _Ben_ and like _death?”_

“I didn’t mean—”

The ghastly voice of the desiccated corpse that had once been her grandfather fills her mind, cackling and beckoning her.

_Good, good._

The darkness in her veins _sings._

She remembers, and she wants to forget _._

Rey throws a heavy piece of sheet metal across the room, screaming in rage.

**_Oh, Rey._ **

“Not _you!”_ she whispers, eyes wide and panicked as she searches the room for him, even though he isn't there and _he would never be there_ —

“You… leave me alone!” she sobs, unsure if she means Luke or _him._

**_You don’t mean that._ **

“Don’t tell me what I feel,” she snarls. “Don’t tell me what I _mean_ —”

“Rey!” Luke is holding his hands out, palms up, conciliatory. And despite everything, there is still something in Rey that wants to run to him for comfort, for reassurance. But he’s not her father and he never wanted to be her master.

She remembers the island and the hut and the rain—

_You created Kylo Ren._

She ignores Luke’s surprised shout, not even turning to face him as she flees the workshop. The midday sun is bright, too bright.

It feels so _wrong._

Rey stumbles in the sand, grains sifting into the tops of her boots as she falls to her knees. She rips them off, throws them as hard as she can and _screams_ , screams 'til her belly hurts and her lungs are empty.

She wants to run for the Falcon, run across the desert til her feet are blistered and her skin red. And then _maybe then_ the pain in her body would match the pain in her soul.

Instead she crumples into a heap, lets the wind wash over her and stares at the horizon. In a few hours the suns would sink beneath it. She would wait.

Rey is very good at waiting. She closes her eyes, focuses on the sun beating down on the exposed skin of her shoulders, her calves, her feet.

_Burn me,_ she thinks, _until I’m as black as I feel inside._

There’s no noise but the whisper of wind and her shuddering breaths. When Leia’s soft voice filters in through the haze of anger and pain, it shakes her like a thunderclap.

“What did my idiot brother do this time?”

Rey doesn’t answer, doesn’t even open her eyes. She doesn’t want the comfort and the platitudes and the excuses. She just wants to hurt.

“Don’t tell me, I can guess.” Leia’s voice is slightly closer now, as if her ghost chose to settle on the sand beside Rey’s head. She doesn’t look around to confirm.

Leia continues, unperturbed by Rey’s lack of response. “He’s never been very good with his words. Being dead has done nothing to improve it.”

Silence falls and they sit—for minutes or hours, Rey couldn’t say. The sun beats down on her, and she sweats, feels her skin redden and heat. Her sense of Leia doesn’t fade, a wavering presence brushing the sides of her consciousness.

The ache eases, allows her to speak. Rey swallows a few times, her mouth dry but eyes still wet. She turns over the words in her mind, worrying them into a better configuration over and over again before she finally eeks out—

“Why doesn’t he come?”

Leia sighs.

The pain begins again, and Rey chokes her words out around the stabbing in her ribs. “I mean… you come. Luke comes, and we never even…” She pauses, an insane chuckle burbling out against her better wishes. “We never even really _liked_ each other. But…”

Rey feels the memory of a hand against her back, finally turns her head to look at Leia. The older woman’s palm shifts her to shoulder, giving it a nearly imperceptible squeeze.

“Rey... I don’t know. I can’t find him.”

It’s like a punch in the gut. Rey feels the anger and pain boiling up again, surging strength through her legs as she rockets to her feet. She pants, chest heaving, facing an unperturbed Leia.

“What do you _mean,”_ she grinds out, “you can’t ‘find’ him? He’s _dead!_ He left me alone, he's _gone!_ If he’s not with you, then where is he?”

“I don't know.”

Leia is maddeningly calm and it only stokes the fire of Rey’s ire. Before she can say another word, Leia holds up a finger in a gesture reminiscent of her late husband. “I don’t know where my son is. But somehow I think you _do.”_

“Me? Oh, of course I know. I know _exactly_ where he is,” Rey spits. “He is _dead._ I watched him fade away from me on Exegol. I carried his clothing with me, I—”

_I couldn’t bring myself to bury it next to what was left of you._

“Rey, am _I_ here?” Leia asks simply.

“Aren’t you?” she snarls, knows she isn’t truly angry with Leia yet remains unable to stop herself from lashing out.

“In a manner of speaking, I suppose. But no, I’m not. Not really. When I…” She pauses, making a vague hand motion while smiling. “When I became what I now am, I didn’t just step into a ‘river of the Force’, as you so often described it to me during meditations. I melted into it. I _am_ the water in your river now, Rey.”

Rey lowers her shoulders, feels some of the fight leave her. “But I can see you without seeking the Force.”

“Of course you can, because you don’t have to _seek_ the Force to _see_ it. Sometimes it seeks you, but that’s another matter entirely. My point being—If you are looking at me and talking to me, if you can feel my touch but you don’t know where I am…”

Rey sits back down beside Leia, deflated. “I don’t understand.”

Leia turns to face her fully before continuing, “Rey, if I, who have literally become part of the Force, cannot find my son… then he is somewhere the Force can’t reach.”

“Is this supposed to be comforting?” Rey sniffs, feels her eyes well again as anger turns to despair. “Being beyond the Force… it’s a horrible thing to contemplate.”

“No,” Leia says, lays one of her ethereal hands on Rey’s. “Rey… search your feelings. There’s something hiding, just beyond your reach - I can’t grasp it, but I think you _can.”_

“I can’t let myself think about him,” Rey says softly. “I haven’t called on the Force since the day I buried your lightsabers.” The words she shouted at Luke rang in her ears again, and she flinches at the truth in them. _Like Ben, like death._

“You’ll know when you’re ready. And when you are, I think you’ll see what I mean.” Leia smiles, her edges wavering and thinning.

Rey smiles back weakly, raises a hand in goodbye as Leia dissipates into the air. A hot breeze rises up out of the deep desert, stinging her eyes and drying the tracks of her tears.

**_Rey._ **

She stiffens, alert and searching, “Ben?”

Her whisper receives no reply. Rey sits on the ridge til sundown, lost in thought.

\---

The next morning, Rey rises at her normal time. She pads the sandy floors barefoot til she arrives in the kitchen with its bright light strip and battered appliances. She goads the ancient oven to ignite, fixes herself a piece of bread to warm. A steaming cup of caf appears moments later, and she sips it black while waiting for the bread to burn.

She wonders what needs to be done today—perhaps hauling some of the junk from the old workshop into Mos Eisley would net her some more interesting food.

Despite herself, she’d grown used to rounded meals during her stint with the Resistance. Rey let her mind wander, dredging up memories of breakfasts shared with Rose and Finn and Poe... steaming rolls and hot meat, local fruits and bitter caf, scrounged from whatever they happened to find—and complained about universally with the exception of Rey.

They had good moments, still. To balance out all the bad. Rey is filled with the thoughts of the family she thought she found, but lost all the same. Slipped through her fingers like so many grains of sand.

Perhaps it's her own fault. The truths she should have told them, the things she left unsaid until it was too late, and then the blow could not be softened... and it cost her.

As Rey removes the blackened bread from the oven, she resolves to walk to the Falcon and call Rose later this morning. Perhaps Finn and Poe weren’t ready to hear from her - or she from them, in any case—

But Rose might understand.

\---

Rey trudges to the Falcon, thumbs in the access code, and hauls herself into the pilot’s chair. But her numbed fingers hover over the comm, unable to complete the circuit and dial Rose.

There’s a dull throbbing in the back of her skull, a tugging at her ribs, and Rey feels uneasy.

There are too many echoes in this damn ship.

Her spine tingles, tiny hairs at the nape of her neck prickle—and she twists her head, wondering.

Quiet feet in well-worn shoes pad down the hallway, follow the curve of the ship to rest in the doorway of the small bunk room.

Rey knows what’s there. Knows why the buzzing in her mind grows louder, the aching in her ribs becomes a sharper pain. She just doesn’t understand why she can’t stop herself.

Hands on autopilot, she smooths back the covers to reveal a torn black sweater, neatly folded despite the dust it carries. Black pants and black boots are hidden away in a compartment beneath the floor, but the sweater…

She remembers the first night, burying her face against the soft fabric like it was _him_ and it somehow held the answers—

but of course it didn’t.

That doesn’t stop Rey from gathering it to her, from easing the pain in her chest by laying her cheek against it and closing her eyes and _wishing._

A deep breath, an attempt to conjure the look on his face, the placement of his freckles, the way his lips quirked—

Rey is struck with the reality that his scent no longer lingers on his sweater. She pulls back, stares down at the black fabric and expects to feel something—a bend, a twist, a pull, _anything_ —

but all she feels is emptiness.

The ringing in her ears is deafening.

_I am used to being alone,_ she tells herself. _Alone is good. Alone is safe._

She imagines the sand dunes outside, so similar to those far away where she grew up scrambling through the innards of Star Destroyers—

_It’s better to be alone,_ she thinks.

The gentle insistence in the back of her mind where the deep river once ran, where she now allows only silence, disagrees.

Rey curls herself into the bunk, pulling the sweater with her under the thick blanket. She stares at the bulkhead for hours, still as a stone.

\---

Sleep comes eventually, but it brings no relief with it.

The familiar dust of Exegol surrounds her, its strange blue hue present even in her dreams. She has seen this landscape a hundred times, she has grown accustomed to her psyche tormenting her with these moments.

She wonders what variation will unfold before her today—the harsh reality, or perhaps the cruel vision of a future that cannot be.

When she feels him.

_Ben_ —

She can sense his agony and fear, anger and resolve, as if they are her own. 

Looking down, Rey realizes that her feet are steps away from her own crumpled body. She frowns, unable to recall a time when her psyche had conjured this particular nightmare.

**_Rey_** —

Electrified, she swivels her head toward the crevasse to her left. He is there—he is _calling_ her.

_Ben, I’m coming_ —

Rey finds herself running through the nightmare world, feet responsive and ground disappearing under her strides. She reaches the edge of the pit, looks down to find Ben clinging to an outcropping a few meters below, broken-boned and bloody but looking at her with _those eyes_ —

_Let the dream stay, let me hold him again._

She kneels, throwing herself into the dirt and holding out her hand as if he could grasp it despite being nowhere near his.

_Ben!_

**_You’re here,_** he says, puffing out a breath that dissolves into a faint grin. **_You came._**

She’s puzzled, but continues to hold her hand out all the same. _Of course,_ she reassures, _of course I did. Come with me, Ben._

He smiles sadly, watches a little of the rock he’s gripping crumble. **_I can’t._**

_Don't be silly,_ she protests, stretching her hand out just a little further. _I’m right here._

She feels the Force, and this time she lets it flow through her instead of pushing it away.

He pulls himself up on his shattered right leg, grips her hand - it’s electric, this longing - and her veins sing with the glory of it. It takes all her strength to pull his heavy body from the edge of the pit, and they crumple together in a heap.

_I’ve missed you,_ she cries, her face in the sweater and her hands on his back, his hair, his cheek.

His lips find hers, urgent and longing. **_I know,_** he says against her mouth. He tastes like joy and life, sadness and death, and it’s _crushing_ —this agony, this love. She deepens the kiss, burying her fingers in his hair and trying her best to memorize exactly how he tastes.

_Come with me,_ she begs, knowing he’s only an echo and could follow her no more than a sun could switch its orbit.

He only smiles, brushes back the hair from her face. **_I’ve seen you, hiding again in the sand_** — ** _Rey, why?_**

She pauses before responding, the question out of sync with her expectations.

_It feels safe,_ she says, while thinking it feels nothing like the safety of his arms.

He says nothing in reply, buries his face against her neck. Rey feels blood in the thick strands of his hair where her fingers rest, hears the Force crying out for her to heal him as her heart twists.

_You’re hurting,_ she whispers, _let me help you._

Ben pulls back, looks at her with eyes that hold a fading light; an expression Rey knows all too well. _There is my nightmare,_ she thinks, _I knew I couldn’t outpace it forever._

_I can’t, can I?_ she asks, feels her eyes sting and her breaths catch and _Maker_ why can’t even her dreams bring her peace—

_Ben, I_ —

**_I know,_** he says, with the temerity to smile while tears wet both of their eyes.

And his grip slips—he’s falling back into the dust of Exegol—but his face is unafraid, his eyes are clear and true even to the last.

**_You know what to do._ **

He fades away, and her focus shifts from him to the pit to the scrambled stars in the clearing sky above.

Rey awakes with a jolt, a scream dying on her lips as she realizes her surroundings.

Not Exegol. Not the dust of that dead planet. Just the Falcon, his sweater, and the weight of her memories. She can’t bring herself to move, the pressure of that strange variation in her regular nightmare still smothering.

It felt so real.

She looks down at the sweater, thumbs the thick edge of the collar. Was it real?

She doesn’t want to hope, doesn’t want to lend credence to the voice in her head, but she clutches the sweater and whispers into the silence of the room all the same.

_Ben?_

**_Rey._ **

And that’s what does it, that’s when the dam breaks and and her hidden tears fall. She clutches the sweater to her chest.

_Where are you?_

**_You know._ **

And somehow, she did.

_What do I do now?_

There’s no reply, but she doesn’t expect there to be. In a way, he already told her.

She’s dimly aware that she rises from the bunk, that the walls around her shift, and that she’s walking—no, running to the cockpit. She slams a hand onto the comm, and in a voice thick with tears she cries out for her friend—

“Rey? Rey, is that you? What’s happening, what’s wrong?”

“Rose,” Rey chokes, and the words fall into place.

\---

A day passes, and the fire in Rey’s bones hasn’t abated. She loads the Falcon with the meager supplies she gathered— _can’t stay won’t stay_ —and ignores the vaguely judgmental stare from Luke, as well as Leia’s approving gaze.

Their thoughts on the matter feel inconsequential. Her mind is made up.

Even Rose, who calls again and again on the comm, cannot dissuade her.

“Rey, are you sure you’re alright?” she asks nearly every other hour since Rey told her everything. “I can be there in seven hours. Do you want me to come? I’ll be there.”

Rey refused her, as much as she wanted to see her friend. She knew in her bones this is something she has to do alone.

She pauses for a moment on her final trip into the Falcon, the setting suns lengthening her shadow. Leia’s figure stands at the foot of the ramp, her expression placid and knowing.

It gives Rey pause.

“You were right,” she says; opens her mouth to elaborate further but is stopped by Leia’s widened smile.

“You were ready,” the former General says softly.

_I’m going to bring your son back. I promise._

Rey thinks this, but can’t vocalize it. Somehow she thinks Leia understands all the same.

“I guess this is goodbye,” Leia says, and there’s sadness alongside her hope.

“Will I see you again?” Rey returns, shifting the bundle of tools in her arms. _Can you find me in another world, after I’ve buried your saber in these sands?_

“Oh, I’m sure of it. Just not here.” The General smiles, and Rey manages a weak grin in reply.

“No,” she says, raising the ramp and saying goodbye to the sand, wind, and harsh suns as she watches Leia fade away. “Not here.”

Rey slides into the pilot’s seat, feeling more herself than she has for ages.

Perhaps ever.

Breaking through gravity and atmo is effortless, and soon the stars are laid out before her.

It’s quick work to program the coordinates for Exegol, the navacomputer spitting out an eleven-hour flight time. Rey misses Chewbacca’s company, feeling the weight of his furry paw as she pulls the lever that turns the stars blue.

Starlines streak around her, and for the first time in months Rey smiles.

\---

“Rose - you aren’t picking up, not sure if there’s interference on my end or if you’re just asleep - but I wanted to let you know…”

Rey pauses, stares at the blue of Exegol’s ruins as lightning swirls in the sky above. _I never told them the truth before_ , she thinks, _why start now?_

And besides, the last thing she needs is for them to come charging after her.

“I wanted to let you know I’m alright. Thanks for talking to me… for checking in on me. I don’t want you to worry. We’ll talk soon. Maybe I’ll come see you, yeah?”

It’s a lie, Rey knows it's a lie, but one she wants to be true.

“Anyway. Be good… to yourself, to Finn and Poe. Make sure BB-8’s got his antenna on straight…”

The search for words comes back fruitless. Rey swallows hard, musters what she hopes is a bright smile for the cam. “Bye for now, Rose.”

She clicks off the comm, lets the holomessage fade away and shoot across space. It wasn’t that she wasn't planning on not returning, she tells herself. She just doesn’t know for sure.

Moments later, her boots plume dust as she jumps off the landing ramp. The ever-present storm illuminates the ancient TIE fighter left without a pilot. She wants to wince, straightens her shoulders instead.

Rey only has her own lightsaber with her, the cobbled together saber-staff that was a little unsteady, just like her. She takes nothing else, feels the Force mutter in agreement along her backbone.

It’s a long walk back to the throne, to the strange amphitheater and the pit. Rey feels none of the trepidation she expected, her renewed connection with the Force instead steadying her steps and shoring up her resolve.

This was the way.

The Force thrums happily, no peripheral sense of danger lurking to upset it. She’s content to trust it for now. She passes no signs of life, past or otherwise, and wonders briefly if the Force or some native creature took care of what remained of the Knights of Ren.

The Death Star's ruins flash in her memory as she scrambles up a particularly arduous hill, and she grits her teeth mulling over what transpired there. How she embraced her anger and grief, swung in rage but struck home in regret.

The dark had risen in her then, but she bit it back, crying out for the light as Ben gasped for breath.

She saved him once. She could do it again. She _must._

Otherwise Rey doesn't know what to do. She, who has to keep wandering this world alone - what other hope remains? What was she to dream of, when her past had gone? Live with only a memory?

He hasn't spoken again since the Falcon, and Rey refuses to wonder about what that means exactly. She has the certainty of her conviction to guide her, the half-remembered dream, the Force's pulse in her blood telling her to _follow_ —and that will be enough.

She passes the throne with a shudder. The rage she carries in her calls out only once before it's immediately quashed.

The crevasse looms like a great wound in the ground, and adrenaline shakes her limbs as she nears the edge. The fall is long, peppered with craggy outcroppings and great jutting thrusts of stone.

But the feeling is strongest here—the pull and certainty nearly suffocating. At any rate, she doesn't want to stay long enough to find out what lurks in the gloom around her.

Rey hesitates, shimmies her toes along the side before dropping to sit with her legs dangling into the abyss. She doesn't think Ben is down there, not really—it's impossible, she saw him fade away in the dirt behind her—but the Force tugs at her belly, urges her downward.

Briefly Rey wonders if a fall is required, a sacrifice mimicking Ben’s own descent, before she wises up and puts her scavenging skills to use once more. The precipice just below is sturdy and wide—a good starting point. The Force agrees, goading her on as Rey slides down a foot or so to the smooth surface.

She lands with sure feet, sizing up which outcropping that would make a good target. A particularly loud thunderclap echoes above, and Rey looks skyward for just a moment.

Above her head is a patch of clear sky, the storm clouds circling around it in an untidy whorl. They’re bright, brighter than any she’d seen before - and look… _wrong_. Rey blinks, trying to remember if she’s seen these naked stars before this moment.

In her dream… in her nightmare?

A lightning bolt strikes behind her, loosening a shower of rock from the cliff wall. Rey screams, bracing herself on the ledge fruitlessly. Her balance is lost, the perch beneath her feet dissolves in the onslaught of crumbling stone. She bloodies her fingers trying to hold on; swings her legs out of the path of the first boulder, only to be caught by the second.

She falls, eyes on the stars before her vision blacks.

The Force sings.

\---

Hazy eyes are greeted by starlines, great solid ones hanging still and steady in a deep black sky. One blink does not move them, neither does two.

Rey tries three for good measure before shaking her head, feeling a pins-and-needles tingling run through her limbs. She flops awkwardly to a seat, arms too heavy to support her gracefully and legs too unsteady to walk.

She immediately regrets looking down.

She sees nothing—screams and scrambles in a most undignified manner before realizing _no,_ she wouldn’t fall into the great ocean of stars below her.

Rey lays for a moment, panting, gasping at the terror and the wonder of the galaxy stretched out before her. It’s then she realizes the Force is still—not gone, per se, simply stilled. She sucks in a deep breath. Somehow having her sense of power taken rather than banishing it of her own volition is strangely painful.

It still hangs heavy in her bones. Even with the tingling gone they feel sluggish, unresponsive.

_Otherworldly._

Rey takes a moment, watches a spiral of stars swirl in the dark beneath her boots. She staggers up, drags herself off in the only direction that feels remotely sensible with hesitant uneasy steps.

The old ache in her ribs is back, but it _pulls_ now—no longer a sharp tug, but a slow and inexorable draw of fate. Even with the great river of Force frozen over, she can still hear Ben—Ben, and his beating heart.

The endless parade of the galaxy stretches before her, and she surveys it unafraid. All she feels is wonder and curiosity—purpose and peace.

Looking back, Rey could never mark the minutes, the days, the hours she trudges through the treadmill of stars - only that she never felt hunger or thirst or fatigue. Time is a construct all too easily abandoned.

But when she finally, _finally_ sees Ben’s spirit across the stars it grinds to a halt all the same.

Her side blossoms with warmth, the unhealable wound of loss closing. Rey stumbles at the sensation, the lifted weight of the pain she’s carried making her feel lighter than air. Her steps are joyous now, no longer halting, and her nose stings with his scent—starlight and dew, the cold air of morning.

His name from her mouth is the only sound in the galaxy, and he turns toward her in surprise. His face is the same as Rey remembers—but somehow younger without the dark line of the scar across his face. A smile, toothy and jagged and impossibly warm—

“Rey.”

He solidifies, she dissolves. The galaxy condenses to a pair of arms that hold her tighter as she begins to cry.

“You came,” he says, and Rey nods against his chest.

“I came.”

She knows she shouldn’t cry, that there is nothing to cry about—but the rage she carried for so long shatters, and the shards turn into tears. They stand like that for a while—too long, perhaps. Rey knows only the rise and fall of Ben’s chest, the weight of his arms across her back, the softness of his hair between her fingers.

She feels him look around before dipping his head to whisper conspiratorially against her ear, “I sure hope you remember where you docked, because I can’t quite find my ship.”

Despite herself Rey laughs, wipes her tears on the back of her hand. “Is that—” She falters, sniffs, and starts again, “Is that what took you so long?”

He presses a kiss into her hair, lays his cheek against the crown of her head. “Would have been home ages ago.”

“I’ve got bad news then, Ben Solo,” Rey says as she wriggles back into his embrace, resting her cheek against his chest again. “I think we’re going to be waiting a bit for a ride back.”

“That’s alright,” he says. “We’ve got everything we need.”

Rey pulls back and stands on her tiptoes, her hands tangling Ben’s hair as she presses her lips to his. This time his arms practically crush her as he tugs her closer, but there is no urgency, no fear—only joy and peace.

Rey’s not sure she’s ever felt more complete.

The Force thaws, warmer than the summer’s breeze, and Rey blinks in surprise.

As Ben opens his mouth to remark on the odd sensation, a star system to their left spins faster. The strange whorl widens and brightens til a beautiful vortex appears, all the majesty around them dimming by comparison.

“...I think our ride’s here,” Rey says softly. Ben _hmms_ in agreement. She turns to him, looking into his deep eyes and smiling with ease.

“Come with me?”

She holds out her hand expectantly, remembering all the times before.

It had always been him with an extended hand—over a fire, a battleground, a hangar bay. Their own fear. _What would have become of me,_ Rey wonders, _if I took his hand the last time he asked?_

Ben seems to be considering the same thing, looking from Rey to her outstretched hand with eyes that carry the weight of their past mistakes.

_This time_ , she thinks, _this time it will be different._

Ben has no reply, only squeezes her hand tightly as he steps towards the light.

\---

They awake in a tangle of limbs on a too-small bed, one Rey recognizes instantly as her pallet from Ajan Kloss. Bright sunlight illuminates a patch of the steel floor, and a native bird sings an inexplicably complicated song somewhere deep in the jungle.

The world is muted and serene. Rey wonders where the urgency she felt in her bones for years has fled.

She stretches, shaking her head and feeling like she slept for months. Her mouth is thick, and she’s overcome with a desperate need for a drink. After a few attempts to dislodge Ben’s deeply scarred tree trunk-thick leg from where it rests across her hips, she settles for an undignified shimmy to the floor.

Standing naked in the sunbeam, she suddenly realizes the oddity of her situation.

Before she can process the _hows_ and _whys_ of being on Ajan Kloss again, there’s three booming knocks on the door. Rey dives for the nearest piece of fabric while Ben awakes with a snort, jolting ungracefully from the bed and lurching for his lightsaber.

Rey notes that he, too, is very naked.

“Would you get going already? You’re holding up the briefing _yet_ _again_. 0800 doesn’t mean 0835, Rey.”

“...Rose?” It comes out in a squeak, and Ben whirls to face her as if he’d been completely unaware of her presence.

He turns a very appealing shade of red, and Rey quirks an eyebrow upward.

“Would anyone else come drag your lazy ass out of bed with a knock instead of busting the door down? Yes, it’s me, of course it’s me. Are you decent? I’m coming in—”

“No!” Rey howls, throwing Ben the blanket and scrambling for the nearest pile of clothes that look remotely like hers. She tugs on leggings, boots, and a long dark grey tunic, hopping on one foot and staring down the door as if it could bite.

She sees Ben do the same out of the corner of her eye, wriggling into pants while holding a black sweater - and her heart shudders.

“Alright, I’m co…” Rey trails off when Rose throws open the door, watches the short woman look between her and Ben with surprise that quickly turns into what can only be described as a shit-eating grin.

“...Suddenly, I understand why you’re late,” Rose says blithely.

Rey blinks, looks between Rose and Ben in confusion.

“You can, uh… you can see him?” Rey says lamely, her mind racing— _is this not an apparition?_ She watches Ben cross his massive arms over his equally massive chest and—oh, he’s still missing the _scar_ —

_What happened?_

“Uh, yes?” Rose questions, her glee mingling with confusion. “Of course? He’s been with us for over a year now, since Snoke’s death… It would be _very weird_ if I couldn’t see him.”

“You… have—he _has_?” Rey splutters, wincing as she looks back at Ben, who shrugs maddeningly.

**_Apparently so_** , he whispers in her mind—and gooseflesh raises on Rey’s arms as she remembers.

She blinks, clearing away the echoes of the vortex of light and focusing on Rose again. She eyes Ben with admiration and trepidation.

“Ben, I don’t know what you did to Rey last night but uh… maybe you could let Armie in on the secret, huh? Maker, wait til he finds out about this…” Rose chuckles, eyes darting between the two of them but lingering on Rey.

“Armie—I’m sorry, _Hux?”_ Ben chokes, stumbling backward as Rose’s eyes widen again.

“Okay, that’s it, I’m telling Leia you’re missing the meeting and you two nerf-herders are getting a full med scan. Did you get into some spice last night or something? A weird pollen? Never mind, I don’t want to know—stay put, and for Maker’s sake Ben put on a _shirt_ —wait for me to come back, because I’m truly worried you won’t find the med tent and you’ll wander into the jungle and _then_ I’ll have to go find you in _there_ and it’s just… It’s way too hot for that today, Rey.”

Rose shuts the door behind her with a _snick_.

Rey looks from the door to Ben and back again, fear and joy and confusion warring for supremacy.

“Ben - Maker, what did we do?”

He gapes at her, looking down at his hands like he expected to find something there.

Rey feels a tremor in their bond. _Ben?_

He falls to his knees, looking up from the floor with eyes both hopeful and utterly, utterly terrified.

“Leia? My mom - Rey, _my mom’s still here.”_

Rey sinks to the floor beside him, throwing her arms around his neck as Ben’s shoulders heave with a silent cry.

\---

The med scan reveals nothing of note, as Rey expects. She's released with an admonition to eat more balanced meals—apparently months of caf, bread, and protein powder had left her lacking in other areas.

Leia stands outside when she emerges from the tent, her smile placid and knowing.

Rey stops dead in her tracks, searching the older woman’s eyes as _something_ niggles at the back of her mind.

“Hello, Rey. I’ve been waiting for you.”

Leia smiles, her eyes twinkling.

Rey returns it, unabashed and unashamed.

\---

Time stretches into a long six months. In some ways it feels like an eternity—the days forming a strange pattern that replicates itself imperfectly.

The Force is oddly muted here, no longer a raging river but instead a still calm pool. Rey finds she doesn't much mind. It takes Ben longer to adjust.

Despite this, their bond burns as bright and clear as the day they first discovered it.

Rey and Ben fall in step with life here as best they can, helping the Resistance mop up anything remaining of the Sith loyalists and First Order stragglers when needed. No one speaks of Palpatine’s defeat, and neither of them can muster the courage to ask for the details that everyone assumes _they_ know.

Ben is content to let it remain a mystery, Rey more than happy to let the heavy secret of her supposed lineage fade into obscurity.

They stay with the last members of the Resistance for a few weeks after the first session of the newly re-established Galactic Senate. Rose and Hux, Finn and Poe, Chewie, Kaydel, and all the rest bid them well. Their hands are hands busy with rebuilding and in any case, they only have a partial understanding of these two Force users who were always a step apace from them.

One sunny day, they finally leave with the Falcon and Leia’s blessing. She has a galaxy to run, after all, and they are content to leave her to it.

Ben kisses his mother’s forehead. She pats his cheek affectionately and reminds them that a position of their choosing awaits at the end of their travels. Her unspoken admonition to _run_ —to go and _live_ and never return to give back their stolen time—is heard loud and clear, magnified by the tears shining in her eyes.

Rey waves at her from the door of the Falcon, knowing they will see her again—just not here.

\---

There are weeks full of nothing but starlines—of naked skin, lush forests, and the smell of loamy dirt as they camp under stars that are just a _bit_ off from the ones Rey remembers.

Ben lets his hair grow long, ties it back in a knot at the nape of his neck. He often tries to teach Rey to plait hers, mimicking some of the extinct styles from his mother’s homeworld. She sits patiently, even when his thick fingers yank too hard on her scalp and it takes him too long to remember which way the twists should go.

Neither of them mind when he unwinds the braid in frustration and kisses her soundly instead.

They visit Chandrila; the ruins of Coruscant. They walk the silent halls of their familial homes on Naboo, listening for ghosts but hearing none. 

When Rey sees a waterfall for the first time, she cries.

Wherever they go, there always seems to be _someone_ in need of help. Perhaps it’s a gentle nudge from this stilled Force pushing them towards it, but they never fail to heed the call. They are as quiet as possible, but rumors of miracle workers seep into the galaxy’s lore nonetheless.

Rey wonders how many of the whispers make it back to Leia, to their friends. She never asks.

Months stretch to years, the deep scars on Ben’s right leg fading to a silvery pink. When Rey notices his hair beginning to grey at the temples, she teases him but kisses each and every strand of it.

One day Ben looks at Rey in just the right way and something clicks—a longing and a pull for someplace she thought she never wanted to see again sticks in her throat.

Only then do they take the Falcon back to Tatooine. They set down by the old Lars Homestead— _but not too close_ , Rey admonishes, _in case someone still lives there_ —and walk to the top of a dune.

The twin suns slip below the horizon, and if their timing is by accident or some cosmic design Rey can’t be sure. The three moons start to glow in the dusky sky, and Rey watches them rise with her back against Ben’s chest and his arms wound around her.

He buries his face in her hair, which moves gently in the breeze from the deep desert. She feels him murmur against her skin, wonders if she listens hard enough if his words would echo on the wind the same way she once heard them.

She reaches up to squeeze his hand, his soft mouth kissing the column of her neck. She twists her head to catch his lips with hers, tasting salt and sun something undeniably _Ben_ in their kiss.

When they break apart he’s grinning, the smile lines around his mouth deepening and the dimples in his cheeks appearing. And it’s a beautiful sight, this rendition of the same toothy grin she etched into her memory forever.

Rey loves it, loves _him_ , so indescribably much.

Ben looks at her quizzically, brushes hair from her eyes as they well with tears.

She smiles, shaking her head and burying her face in the black sweater he wears. His strong arms are around her again, and Rey settles in her place against his chest.

She looks out at the horizon, and remembers.


End file.
